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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27161710">I'm a doctor, not a freaking Marshmallow!</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenofroses12/pseuds/queenofroses12'>queenofroses12</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Whumptober Star Trek [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Trek: The Original Series</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Doubt, Frenemies, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Whumptober 2020</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-07 00:09:00</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,313</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27161710</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenofroses12/pseuds/queenofroses12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Whumptober fic. Prompt 1 - Waking up tied up.</p><p>When a landing party goes wrong, McCoy gets the short end of the stick...</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Leonard "Bones" McCoy &amp; Spock</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Whumptober Star Trek [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1982605</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>41</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Whumptober 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>I'm a doctor, not a freaking Marshmallow!</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>“Blast it all, I am a doctor, not a freaking marshmallow!”</p><p>The natives didn’t pay much attention. Well, a few pointed and clapped, and a few made  a weird action which was probably their version of making the  sign of the Cross.</p><p> “Let me go, you-“</p><p> SPLAT!</p><p> Some rotting vegetable thing (at least he hoped it <em>was</em> vegetable…) hit him right in the mouth. By the time the doctor had finished retching the taste out of his mouth, the pile of sticks at the bottom of the stake was almost complete.</p><p>The native in charge – a tall, albinowhite guy dressed in something that looked like a cross between a Klingon party wear and Joanna’s snowpants – stepped forward and began droning on and on. Damn, wherever you go the style of sermons never change. Not that McCoy was particularly eager for this sermon to finish, considering he knew what the finale would be.</p><p>Going on a landing party was  not good to begin with – someone up there really liked to send complications their way. Somehow managing to get lost and stumble right into the middle of a native secret ritual was bad. Getting knocked out by said natives and waking up trussed up like a Christmas Turkey was worse.</p><p>But  waking up trussed up like a Christmas turkey <em>and</em> tied to a stake?</p><p>“Someone up there really hates me” the doctor muttered, earning a glare from the snowpants guy for daring to interrupt the sermon.</p><p>  Damn. The sermon was over. The guy stepped forward, and someone in a less ornate snowpants handed him a blazing torch.</p><p>“Great. Freaking great.”</p><p>This was it. this was really it. No last minute rescue. Of course, Prime Directive, so no chance of simply beaming him up and out of the native version of Salem.</p><p>If Jim was in command… He wouldn’t break the Prime Directive either, McCoy told himself. Not for you, not for anyone. Yeah, but he would have found a way to bend it… But Jim was lying unconscious in the sickbay after a serious bout of choriomeningitis. He had passed the danger stage, but wouldn’t be in any shape to remember his own name for a day or more.</p><p>Spock was in command. And the chances of the Vulcan breaking – or even bending – the Prime Directive…</p><p>”Hell will freeze over. Damn hobgoblin.”</p><p>No, be fair. Spock would make the same choice even if it was his own life at stake. Needs of the many, blah blah. They were beginning to light the damn pile…</p><p>Damn you, Spock! What are you going to tell Jim when he wakes up?</p><p>The truth, of course. Logically and succinctly put. And Jim would understand, wouldn’t he? Even if he didn’t understand, he would forgive him…It may take  a little while, but he would forgive him. Because that was the way Spock was wired, and if anyone knew it, Jim would. He probably couldn’t be different if he tried…</p><p>But if it was Jim down here, Jim tied to the stake and about to be roasted like a pig…Would Spock have adhered to the Prime Directive then? Or would he have said – though of course not in so many words – that the Prime Directive could go get stuffed? And the rest of the crew…Would they have stood by if Jim was the one captured? Stood by and let that hobgoblin…</p><p>Stop. Just stop, Len.</p><p>You aren’t going out like this, you aren’t going out ranting at him.</p><p>They would be watching, he supposed, from orbit. They could get a ringside view if they wanted.. Were they watching now? Spock, Uhura, Sulu…Chekov would probably have looked away, not able to watch. Just a kid. ..Maybe Uhura and  Sulu would look away, too.</p><p>Spock wouldn’t. He would watch, make himself watch. Would probably think he owed it to see what his decision had done.</p><p>McCoy glanced upwards. He tried to smile, tried to show it was okay, that he understood. He didn’t, really, but that wasn’t the point.</p><p> ‘Good luck, you guys’ he mouthed. They could lip read, all of them. ‘You too, hobg..Spock. Good luck, live long and prosper, however you  say it. Tell Jim and Joanna I said goodbye.’</p><p>The flames were beginning to creep up. McCoy watched with a numb fascination. Smoke was curling upwards,  obscuring his view of the natives. The snowpants guy was leading them on  a chant. How long? Sometimes they tied gunpowder to the stake…So that it was over quick..But no gunpowder here, they weren’t at that stage yet…</p><p>Breathe in the smoke, may be? Get it over with before the flames really got to work on him? They were at his legs, the boots beginning to melt..The black smoke billowed up with an awful stench.</p><p> He couldn’t have breathed in if he tried. He couldn’t breathe, period. It was as hot as the fire, the smoke, ashes… A fit of coughing choked his scream. Damn, damn, damn! Of all the dumb ways to die…All the really really dumb ways to die… The fit of coughing wasn’t passing, and he felt his vision blur. It was all smoke and flames around, anyway. He felt the final tingling in his limbs, his senses fading, the  body finally giving up the fight…</p><p> The world faded away.</p><p>And then re-formed into the transporter room.</p><p> “What the hell?” Christine and M’Benga were hurrying forward, grinning with evident relief. A hypo hissed against his shoulder, and things began to look –and sound – clearer.</p><p> “About time, too” Christine commented “We were cutting it a bit too close.”</p><p> “Had to wait for the smoke to get dense enough” M’Benga  explained. “If any of them down there had noticed the demon vanishing into thin air, it could have been really awkward.”</p><p> Spock stood  at the transporter console, next to Kyle, his face as impassive as always. He had not stepped forward with the rest of the unofficial welcoming committee, but his eyes were fixed on the doctor, assessing his condition.</p><p>“So you did decide to bend the rules?” McCoy grinned. His voice was  hoarse from the smoke he had breathed in, but if a sore throat was all the damage he had to show for the mess down there, he would consider himself let off very easy indeed. “Well, now I have really seen everything!”</p><p>The Vulcan raised an eyebrow.</p><p>“I certainly did nothing of the sort, doctor. The Prime Directive forbids our interference with the native culture. The rescue operation was arranged precisely so as to avoid any such outcome.”</p><p> “Oh yeah? And it wouldn’t be interference if they saw the guy they were burning left no skeleton behind? That fire burns pretty big, but I very much doubt it usually burns hot enough to ash bone.”</p><p>Spock looked at him with the tolerant gaze a teacher reserves for a hyperactive first grader.</p><p>“A crude robotic replica was beamed into your position just as you were beamed out. The natives will find the expected skeletal remains once the fire burns out.”</p><p> “Aye, that was a pretty piece o’ work, e’en if I say so myself.” Scotty, who had remained on the Bridge to monitor how the robot replica played out, entered the room. “ Hollered and coughed just like ye would, when th’ flames got to it.”</p><p>  “There was no time to create a replica that would stand up to close inspection, so the exchange had to be delayed till the pyre was lit and the smoke obscured the proceedings. If any of the natives noticed the exchange – unlikely, as it was perfectly timed – they would consider it merely a trick of the flamelight.”</p><p>McCoy began to ask who had thought up  that plan, but then didn’t.  There was no need to ask. You just keep getting harder to figure out, don’t you, Spock?</p>
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